Three years ago, lawyer Jordan van den Berg was an obscure TikTok creator who made videos that mocked real estate agents.
But today the 28-year-old is one of the most high-profile activists in Australia.
Posting under the moniker Purple Pingers, Mr van den Berg has been taking on the nation’s housing crisis by highlighting shocking renting conditions, poor behaviour from landlords, and what he calls government failures.
It is his vigilante-style approach - which includes helping people find vacant homes to squat in, and exposing bad rentals in a public database - that has won over a legion of fans.
Some have dubbed him the Robin Hood of renters.
Removed by mod
I’m not sure if Robin Hood fits. He’s not stealing. Either way, fuck predatory landlords.
Given the abstract nature of a lot of the economy these days (which unsurprisingly benefits those with wealth) it’s debatable if it fits to be honest. I would lean more towards yes. They would argue that by exposing bad conditions, helping people lower the cost, causing a rental to go empty, or whatever else means they aren’t getting the money they feel entitled to.
The same kind of arguments are often used when corporations argue that piracy is stealing. All that has happened is an unauthorised copy of a movie/etc had been created. Yet that is called stealing and they try and fine people sometimes thousands more than what a legal copy would cost.
Illegally appropriating access is close enough.
He’s encouraging squatting, which is stealing. He’s an awful person.
There’s entire countries that are on land that wasn’t originally theirs. Stealing isn’t sufficient for evil on it’s own.
Found the landlord.
If there is an empty house,and they aren’t doing damage, no harm no foul.
Forcing bad landlords to fix their properties, go for it.
Squatting yeah no. Get the f out
What’s the harm in squatting, as long as they aren’t damaging the property, and the property is well and truly vacant?
If by definition of truly vacant you mean
No one is knocking on the door saying hey get out, and there is reasonably no one going to come knocking on the door… Then yeah fine it’s empty. Then I don’t care. But if anyone who has the title is saying get out then yeah get out.
If there is someone who has the title says get out, and the squatter doesn’t leave, it’s basically theft of property.
How is it theft of property? Theft usually involves taking something material away from someone. If the property owner has left their property vacant, having a squatter there doesn’t change anything. They’ve gone from making no money on their vacant property to… still not making money on their property.
And don’t say “the squatter is preventing the property owner from making future profit off of the property”, because now you’re not talking about theft. Profits that don’t exist yet can’t be stolen.
If I want a piece of property and somebody moves in there, squats, they are basically preventing me from using that piece of property as I choose. Yes I could go in there anyways but let’s be honest how would I actually use it in the way that I want if they are in there? How would I lay out financial documents on the kitchen table to do my bookkeeping? Knowing that someone else is in there could easily take pictures of it? That makes no sense. They’ve effectively taken the property from me and prevented me from using it as I choose. That is effective theft. No they didn’t pick up a pen from you and take it away. No they didn’t take a phone and take it away. But they have effectively taken my property.
If they insist on living there for six months, how am I going to be there for six months? Realistically. Think about it. So yeah it is that you may not agree with the term of that. But that to me is just irrelevant. In the eyes of the law it’s leaning more and more towards unlawful usage of the property. Which is why the laws are being wrote to remove squatter rights.
Well, it’s trespassing, but I’d argue it should be a crime to own a house and leave it empty. They should have it rented at least.
It is a crime, a crime against humanity. It’s just not a crime recognized in most legal systems.
Having more than you need of anything, while other people have so little they are on the street, go hungry, or die should be a crime that is punished.
I think you dropped your /s
The problem here is that you seem to value your own property rights over the right of individuals to have shelter. Sure, it’s not an ideal situation; in an ideal society “squatting” shouldn’t occur, but we live in a society where people are forced to choose between being homeless or squatting in someone’s property. If you think they should forgo their right to shelter to preserve your right to property then you are the awful person.
No name calling on this sub. You are blocked.
He called you an awful person.
After you called someone else an awful person. Or is it different when you’re just saying it behind someone’s back?
PS: You’re an awful person.
Name calling. Blocked.
It was phrased as a conditional, they weren’t DIRECTLY saying the other person was awful, they were saying “people who do x are awful.” It leaves it open to the idea that the original commenter does not do x and is therefore not awful.
In YOUR case, yeah, calling someone awful breaks the civility rule.
Does the rule only apply if they’re name-calling other commenters and not the subject of the article? If not then mke_geek’s original comment should be removed since he directly calls the subject of the article an awful person with no conditional.
Personally I think this rule is being a bit over-enforced and none of these comments should have been removed. Being overly strict with civility rules allows bad actors to take advantage of “civility politics” to shut down dissent.
Edit: except maybe the one calling them a dickhead, I get why that one was removed. The ones that just reflect their own words back at them I think should be left alone.
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“If this energy was directed to our MPs and senators, maybe there would be sufficient funding and resources to resolve public housing waitlists,” said a spokesperson for the Real Estate Institute of Australia.
This is the most aggravating part of the article for me. This will force policy change way faster than “putting that energy into pushing representatives.” Which is twice removed from the issue.
He’s helping people find shelter, AND he’s causing a huge stir, taking it worldwide, and making news. THIS is the type of direct action that we need.
Less incrementalism, more fucking over landlords and making the ownership class uncomfortable.
Bugging politicians can work, if you’re sufficiently relevant to re-election. This dude has achieved that relevance very well by doing what he’s doing.
Sure, but what this stupid fucking association of landlords or whatever is saying is that he needs to “work within the system.” They mean “write to your representatives, vote, donate to politicians, etc.” It’s complete horseshit. Because that clearly hasn’t worked. They don’t want it to work. These people lobby (read: bribe) to make sure the laws keep shifting in their favor. Which is exactly the point. Citizens trying to influence policy are very limited and removed a few steps from the actual decision making and decision makers. They want it to stay that way, because they get to write laws, lobby directly, spend face-to-face time with these people, call their cell phones because they’re large donors, and the winds are blowing ever harder in their favor. Their power grows exponentially while ours dwindles and we become exponentially LESS powerful as lawmakers become more and more insulated from the people they’re supposed to serve.
The quotes in here were indeed horseshit, but voting and donating (plus volunteering!), at least, work pretty well. I don’t want to pick a fight with you, but sometimes boring is good. Shit, even insurgencies get pretty paperwork-heavy at any kind of scale.
Well, I don’t feel like arguing either honestly lol
But I will say that I believe this approach on its own has led us exactly to where we are today. They are—on their own—a bandaid on a massive wound.
The biggest victories for the masses are so often won through direct action, through huge fights with the powerful. Often bloody ones. Strikes are the most powerful tool we have, because the system that is more and more only benefitting the wealthy actually runs on our bodies and minds. And strikes turn bloody because they try to beat us back into submission.
I’m not saying it’s pretty. But it’s a war, and we’ve been surrendering this entire time. And in that surrender, plenty of people have been writing their representatives, voting, signing petitions, etc. The system has continued to get worse. Look how much the recent trend of strikes and walkouts has accomplished for those people. In my industry, the writer’s strike changed a lot for them. Actors too. Which is kinda funny because those of us that don’t work in front of the camera know how well actors are treated, but whatever. Even though they’re wealthy celebrities, against the massive corporations squeezing all of us harder and harder, they’re still kind of on our side.
I’m not saying we need to stop doing any of the tedious work of Revolution. We still need all aspects. But when it’s just the tedium and the quiet work, we keep moving backwards.
That is my point. You’re definitely right, that sort of clerical work is a necessary part of revolutionizing, but when it’s all clerical work and no revolution—which is what we are constantly corralled into, solution-wise—we are stuck slowly falling behind on the treadmill of capitalism. Which is exactly how we’ve found ourselves so far behind at by this point.
LOL - Reported as “not world news”, where the definition is “news outside the US.”
Being as this is Australia and Australia is outside the US…
Is Australia inside the world, though? 🤔
That’s New Zealand you’re thinking of, it’s only there some of the time.
Its natural predator is the cartographer
I thought it was underneath.
It’s more ON the world. I think it’s kinda like the world’s cummerbund, with Antarctica being either the world’s pants or slippers.
Hopefully it ends up better than it did for friendlyjordies.
